"Hardly a minute can have passed before I was back again at the bedside.
In that brief interval she had changed. Her voice had sunk again; it
was so weak that I could only hear what she said by leaning over her and
placing my ear close to her lips.

"'Put it round my neck,' she whispered.

"I clasped the chain of the locket round her neck. She tried to lift her
hand to it, but her strength failed her.

"'Help me to hide it,' she said.

"I guided her hand. She hid the locket in her bosom, under the white
dressing-gown which she wore that day. The oppression in her breathing
increased. I raised her on the pillow. The pillow was not high enough.
I rested her head on my shoulder, and partially opened her veil. She was
able to speak once more, feeling a momentary relief.

"'Promise,' she said, 'that no stranger's hand shall touch me. Promise
to bury me as I am now.'

"I gave her my promise.

"Her failing breath quickened. She was just able to articulate the next
words:

"'Cover my face again.'

"I drew the veil over her face. She rested a while in silence. Suddenly
the sound of her laboring respiration ceased. She started, and raised
her head from my shoulder.

"'Are you in pain?' I asked.

"'I am in heaven!' she answered.

"Her head dropped back on my breast as she spoke. In that last outburst
of joy her last breath had passed. The moment of her supreme happiness
and the moment of her death were one. The mercy of God had found her at
last.

"I return to my letter before the post goes out.

"I have taken the necessary measures for the performance of my promise.
She will be buried with the portrait hidden in her bosom, and with the
black veil over her face. No nobler creature ever breathed the breath of
life. Tell the stranger who sent her his portrait that her last moments
were joyful moments, through his remembrance of her as expressed by his
gift.

"I observe a passage in your letter to which I have not yet replied. You
ask me if there was any more serious reason for the persistent hiding of
her face under the veil than the reason which she was accustomed to give
to the persons about her. It is true that she suffered under a morbid
sensitiveness to the action of light. It is also true that this was not
the only result, or the worst result, of the malady that afflicted her.
She had another reason for keeping her face hidden--a reason known
to two persons only: to the doctor who lives in the village near